Polish Your Social Media Presence To Secure Your Job Interview

Your social media posts and statuses might make you cool among your friends—but they could also cost you a job, a new study finds. According to recruiting platform Jobvite, the results might be disconcerting to those who tweet first and ask questions later. The data shows 93% of HR managers will scan a candidate’s social profile before making a recruiting decision.

You’re under the Scanner

Almost 9 out of 10 recruiters are looking through social media profiles – especially the ones on LinkedIn and Facebook. What they find there determines your odds of being called for an interview. If you’ve got a proper profile, you are likely to get a call but if there are controversial things that make you look suspicious and possibly not a good employee, then it’s over for you. The worst thing one can do is make any kind of references to illegal drugs on social media. 83% of recruiters feel doing so is a strong turn off. Apart from this, sexual posts, 70% of recruiters say will count against you. About two thirds of the recruiters told Jobvite that posts including profanity put them off; over half of them didn’t like posts on guns and 44% saw posts on alcohol as concerning.

The fact is that social media has overwhelmed us to an extent that we don’t reasonably think before making things public. So, when you apply for a job, make sure you groom your social media presence before you head out for that job interview. It can really weigh in as far as your prospective recruiter choosing the right fit for his company is concerned.

Polish Your Social Media Profiles

Many jobs will require you to leverage the world of social media and updating your profiles across various online platforms will showcase your knowledge of this growing field. Utilize the ‘About You’ section on Facebook, the ‘Introduction’ section on Google+ and the ‘Bio’ section on Twitter to reflect your true personality.

On Facebook, you can change the visibility of your posts or go to your profile’s Privacy Settings, then click on Limit Past Post Visibility and hide numerous posts with only one click. Also, another option is to delete inappropriate posts altogether.

Twitter is more straightforward as you can make your whole profile private. In doing so, you will disable the option for other users to retweet any content you have posted. At the same time, though, others will be able to respond to you publicly, so be alert of your discussions nevertheless.

Image-based social media Instagram is one prone to recruiters’ checks too. You can navigate to Edit Your Profile and then click the Posts Are Private setting. Now people will need to send you a request for following you before they have an access to any of your images or even your list of existing followers.

You can also let only approved followers see your content which gives you total freedom over who sees what when it’s about your own Instagram social presence.

LinkedIn is a social media platform for business purposes only. It wouldn’t be appropriate to do anything else there but maintain a healthy professional image and post content related to your industry and professional interests only.

Change Your Facebook Profile Photo If Necessary

Even if you keep your profile private, recruiters will still be able to see your face, or more specifically, your profile picture. Facebook now allows all profiles to come up in search results and no longer provides the option to hide your information. The best thing to opt for is a confident picture that leaves a good impression on anyone who sees it. If you choose an innocuous picture like that of a beautiful sunset or a picture of your new puppy, you’ll miss an opportunity for the recruiter /employer to know you before you actually sit down face to face.

Review Your Google+ Posts

In case you’re new to this social platform, you may not have thought about making your posts private, but you should do so now. On Google+, click on your photo and then choose ‘Privacy’. Here you can determine how and if you want your posts to be shown to the public. In case of your previous posts, you can review the privacy of each by viewing your post and then following along to the right and you will see the date, how it was posted and then who can see it. Saw a potentially suspicious post? ‘Lock’ it so that no one can share it, or you can even delete it.

Be Careful About What You Re-blog

Be it a re-tweet, a link on Tumblr or a share on Facebook, what you endorse speaks a lot about you. An employer may draw conclusions from it without even meeting you. Only because you didn’t post it initially, it doesn’t mean that it won’t be associated with your personality if you choose to hit the reblog button. Delete anything and everything that could get you taken off the shortlist before you even think about the interview.

Get Rid of Excessive Tweets

Tweeting shows that you’re capable of using the medium and engage in social media, but doing it every twenty minutes implies something else to a recruiter. If you tweet way too often, it goes on to show that you have too much time on your hands and that you don’t indulge in any other useful activity. In the Twitter-sphere, choose quality over quantity.

The Bottom Line

Job seekers need to enhance their social media presence else they risk their professional careers. They should also do a web search of their own name and find out what results a potential employer would see. For instance, a job applicant, unfortunately, had the same name as a convicted criminal. Furthermore, he was the one who came up first in the search results.

If you find something adverse on searching your name and it’s actually about somebody else with the same name, let the employers know you are not that person. Include an explanatory note on your covering letter when applying for the job. The above tips can help you clean up your social media profiles so that you don’t lose your job. With a little control and caution over how employers use social media checks, job seekers should maintain high privacy settings and active networks. Like it or not but your online life determines how well you do offline.